This is going to be different from my previous postings, undisturbed by my usual self-appointed editor, helpful as he has been. There will be no effort involved in trying to be concise and clear so that every reader will understand completely. Free association will reign.

When I say, "my family", I will be referring to the one I was raised in only. There is an impulsive reaction driving me to write as I must: a recent death of my remaining brother's beloved. This was almost three weeks ago. When we were informed, we traveled 800 miles, beginning on the day after finding out, to be with him and attend the funeral.

More and more, my brother's atheism is revealed to me; some- thing I don't think my primary family ever noticed. He had, prior to the funeral, told his beloved's family that they could choose the ceremony. They chose to have a non-denominational preacher conduct it. So - here was this man from out of nowhere, reading the stock obituary from the newspaper, and scripture passages, the same-old, same-old, 23rd psalm at the gravesite. Afterwards, he came back to the funeral home and helped himself to the refreshments. My brother took me aside to tell me how he almost walked out when that man started talking, he was so upset. And we both agreed that when life is eternal, life is cheap. But- the believers have no consideration to ask the bereaved lover if he wants their beliefs over- ` riding his feelings. (The same applies to a woman who told him and me, "I know you two don't feel this way, but she's in heaven".) Why don't the religious-minded realize that such a statement is grossly inappropriate under the circumstances? In fact, why don't they care that all their impositions on a multiple-beliefs, non-beliefs society are inappropriate? Yesterday, a week from when her body was laid out in the funeral home, he told me with scoffing, "She's in a better place now! She's dead. Yeah, right.”

You have to understand my brother. He's practical, caring, loving, no nonsense, outspoken but considerate. He doesn't bother other people's beliefs. He loved his woman with all his heart, cared for her through thick and thin, bestowed his kindness and love on a person who had previously never known caring. From the beginning of their relationship, she told him she did not want to marry, anyone. They were together 35 years; on the ribbon attached to the biggest display of red roses above her coffin, were the words, “Beloved Fiancé." In the last week of her life, he spent each day at the hospital with her, leaving only to get lunch, or let the dog out. (she would want him to do that.) And, when medical science had exhausted all hope, it was his decision to pull the plug, and when this was done, everyone said, "Goodbye Edna,” and Edna opened her eyes and said goodbye.

Now- here is a thought I've had ever since that day: My brother, who is an atheist, could not be a more faithful, loving, man. And yet, the believers will elect a man who is a serial adulterer, and abandoned a wife dying of cancer, for president, because he is a Christian, and NOT one like my brother, because he isn't.

Yesterday, we were on the phone, and I told him about an article I saw in his local paper when we were there, about a pastor who saw "the face of Jesus" in not just one piece of wood in his church, but several pieces, and pointed out that, as WizenedSage said, no one knows what "Jesus" really looked like, which led to mentioning how, as a child, I saw many faces in the floorboards of our house. He grabbed on that right away, to tell me how every morning, he sees in the wood cabinet above his coffee maker, a vagina, clear as day, and that he'd rather see that then the face of Jesus, any day.

My dad was a practical man, in fact he made a very good living finding solutions that others apparently didn't see. Maybe that explains why, as a Catholic, he left religious teachings to the nuns. And why he said the rosary every day, did novenas: Pascal's Wager in action, just in case. (My wife's pastor and his wife's name is Wager, defined as "a bet placed on an uncertain outcome." It fits.) My dad went through all the motions, and must have believed some of it: In the last days of his life, he saw the Virgin Mary. But he was drugged up then, too.

My mother, too, left the dogmatic teaching up to the Catholic school. I thank both of them for not bringing it into the house. I've been told that they let me go into the monastery at the age of 14, not out of religious conviction, but because they "didn't know what to do with you." A teen out of control? Hmmm... My mom sang hymns to Jesus and Mary every day while doing housework or ironing, etc. She liked the smaltzy, saccharine ones the Church banned eventually. Too sentimental for theology. Later, she added Tennessee Ernie Ford hymns to her repertoire. She had small statues of Mary, Joseph, St. Jude, on her dresser. If they didn't answer her prayers, she'd turn them to face the wall, her version of making them stand in the corner, facing it.

My sister, who is Edna's age, 86, suffers from poor eyesight, goes to the Shrine of Our Lady, and has been "cured" by Ernest Angley, a Christian faith healer, even though she hasn't. She wasn't even told that Edna died: she will not go to funerals, even her own daughter's (that one is understandable, and is a primary example of Nothing fails like prayer.) For all the consolation that belief is supposed to offer, I feel that my sister, in spite of her wishes to die and go to heaven, is terrified of death, whereas the opposite is true of my brother and I.

Both of our other brothers are gone, one dying under mysterious circumstance I attribute to neglect and/or, mistakes. They were both VERY Catholic. One was a homosexual who suffered from prejudice, and the other with children of whom I suspect only one follows in their parent's Catholic footprints.

We love and we care in the only life we have, they have, with no regrets. We are happy to make others happy, to love and even lose at times. When that person is gone, we know we have given what we could while life exists. What better tribute could one pay to a lover than to recognize this?

There are other things I could reveal in praise of my "kid" brother, but you get the picture. Like the guy down the street from me, he's an atheist, I found out, and after the death of another neighbor, I asked • his widow if HE was a "Humanist", and she said that yes, you could have described him as that. I found that my good buddy from the army days, 51 years ago (we're in touch), is atheist, etc. I don't think any of us was asked on a poll whether we're believers or nons. How many are there, really, we don't even know about, living like my brother, friends, et al, with love, caring, facts, indifferent to belief systems, because we're involved in living itself, no bullshit?

My brother removed the plaques about "God“ this and that, from the walls. He had left them there because they meant something to her. In their stead, he tacked up, "Nothing Fails Like Prayer."

I was a Christian for almost twenty years before serious doubts started to appear this year. The main root cause of my walking away from Biblegod is the reaction of Christians to the breakdown of my marriage three years ago. I was in an abusive relationship and it took me far too long to get out because I was a Christian and I believed that "God hates divorce." So, it this were true, why did god not answer any of my prayer to "save" the marriage? This started me on the road to thinking that god was not really there. I eventually left my abusive ex and tried to start a new life, only to have a whole heap of guilt piled on me, which lead to me being diagnosed with clinical depression. I was then threatened with the predictable b*ble verses, (Malachi 2, Matthew 19) and told that this was all down to me having a "hardness of heart" or that I was "in league with Satan."

My faith has been lost on this and some other issues. I stopped believing in a god who claims in his book to be loving, but then expects people to endure regular beatings, lies, abuse, maltreatment, emotional and psychological abuse just because he says so. I also stopped believing in a God who would condemn an innocent third party of adultery once a person who has been victim of abuse finds happiness and wishes to remarry.

The Christian response to this is the usual "stick fingers in ears, sing lalalala cannot hear you" or shout "the b*ble says this, that and other bullshit, and then say by the way if you disagree with me, you're on the highway to hell..." I know about the awfulness of divorce from first hand experience, but to expect someone to stay in a toxic, abusive relationship just because some book tells you to is absolute madness, of which I choose to no longer participate.

The second reason that I have no faith in biblegod is a linguistic one. I studied language and linguistics and university, and it has always bothered me that there is a distinct christian language and code employed. Many on this website will be familiar with phrases such as "move of the spirit, pressing into Jesus, supernatural provisioning, placed on my heart by the lord," and so on. From a linguistic point of view, these phrases do not make much sense at all. How can we "press into" someone who died 2000 years ago and is now allegedly in heaven? How can the lord place something on a muscle designed to pump blood? Either these phrases are not true at all, or they are made up from an over active imagination during an emotionally charged time of worship. I think that it may be a mixture of both.

I recently found your blog. I am a formerly active and devout Christian that has become an atheist. I thought I would share my story with you. I have very few "real life" people who can really appreciate and relate with my journey so this Internet outlet might be a bit therapeutic. If you were to publish this, which you do have permission to, than please keep my anonymity. Thank you.

I was born into a very religious family. My father was a leader at his Lutheran church. My mother was an active main stream pentecostal denomination member. My grandparents lived immersed in the Bible and Christian television. I was constantly in church and being exposed to preaching and teaching on the TV.

At a very young age I had ta few experiences that completely gripped my developing worldview. Of course, now I have to concede that these experiences were some sort of hallucinations or something. But as a child and youth, these were very real affirmations of my faith.

Once, I awoke alone in my room and saw Jesus standing there smiling. He was shining with rays of light coming off of him. When my mother came in the room he disappeared. Another time I saw a long haired robed man with folded wings and a sword in his hand. I thought it was an angel and I was not afraid. And then when I was a little older there were a few “demonic” experiences that terrorized me for a few years. On my mother’s side, it apparently runs in the family to have unusual religious experiences also.

I rarely admit these things. But this is a “safe place.” Thankfully I don’t take any of these memories to be actual evidences of anything paranormal any longer. If anything, they were fascinating revelations of the working of the human mind. I can sympathize with people who have had odd experiences that seem to validate magical and religious teachings.

I attended a private Christian school where Christianity was indoctrinated into me regularly. Then there was church two or three times each week. So my only influences were Christian. I was a very contemplative and imaginative child. I often mused over the concepts of God, heaven and hell, angels and demons, the Bible, etc. My whole world was filled with these constantly everywhere I would go.

In my teens I drifted away from God. Due to some negative influences and a stymied social development, I focused the part of me that once was devoted to God and became obsessed with white supremacism. It didn’t agree with my religious beliefs. And that very issue was the lynch pin that eventually drove the racism out of me. But for a while there I was consumed with hate.

After that stint I embraced the punk rock music and lifestyle. I played guitar and did vocals in a few bands. I indulged in sex, drugs and rock n roll for a few years. All the while I was struggling with my identity, self worth, direction in life and my religious beliefs that I was trying to ignore. But I truly believed deep inside. And the disquieting voice of faith never stopped calling me.

Days before my twentieth birthday I finally came to terms with my faith. I believed that God has spoken to me about what I should do. So I obeyed this voice and had a little bonfire. I gathered up all of my possessions that I believed to be displeasing to God and I burned them all. A lot of expensive things went up in smoke that night. But to me these were worthless in comparison to the treasures I now had in Jesus. It was not a loss to me, but a serious gain of my life, salvation, my future in heaven, etc. I lost almost all my friends that night. But I met new ones right away.

I immediately began proselytizing. I found a church that took me in and encouraged me. I was as active as possible. And eventually I enrolled in a Bible school in Pensacola, Florida. This school was entirely rooted in a five year strong revival that had attracted thousands from all over. There were many lives radically changed there. And yes, there was controversy over the unusual phenomena associated with the revival meetings and the “laying on off hands” prayer time afterward. I saw and experienced a lot of odd things there. But these phenomena were thankfully not the focus of the meetings or the education I received.

While leading a street evangelism team for the school, I meet my future wife. She and I got along great except when we fought. But I was sure that God my father was blessing me with the love and companionship I had prayed for for years. So I had absolutely no concern about marrying her, even though I had no skills and no decent job. So we soon married and began having our four children one after the other.

We often experienced “miraculous” provision for our needs. Fascinatingly odd coincidences were the norm. I had a gift of grasping the meaning of the scriptures that people respected. I also had a few “prophetic” dreams and premonitions that turned out to have been accurate, one time to the exact minute of the day when our first son would be born. So obviously I and my wife were completely sold on to living out our faith how we saw fit.

We met a small group of people who were like minded with us, each a Bible school grad. We shared a vision to start a house church. So we all packed up and moved together to Kansas City, Mo. My wife and I shared a house with another couple and their children. I got a job at a grocery store and scraped by for seven years there. Most of our life was devoted to the church that whole time. We had a lot of faith, a lot of knowledge, a lot of devotion amongst that group. There was a real bond of community.

We went through a lot of persecution for being independent. But this was expected. However, it seriously strained my relationship with my mother. My wife’s family thought we were odd. I was odd. But I didn’t know that. And I was so knowledgeable with what I believed that few people could carry a conversation about the Bible or church and sway my views in any direction. Most Christians were simply terribly ignorant of their own holy book. One of my goals was to enlighten believers to the “reality” of their God and the depths of wisdom easily found in the scriptures. But it was to no avail. Most Christians aren’t interested in learning. Most didn’t want a faith that was in any way actually requiring of them. But in spite of all this, I knew I was called by God so nothing else mattered.

My marriage however, was progressively eroding away this whole time. We weren't ready when we married. I had my weaknesses and issues. She had her own issues that she carried from her broken home childhood years. We began disagreeing a lot. Then the first crack in my faith I ever felt had begun with a hairline fracture. My endless thirst for knowledge and understanding lead me to investigate science.

I had read numerous Creationists books and magazines over the years. I was thoroughly indoctrinated with Creationist lies and misrepresentations of science. I had not met a person who could refute any Creationists claims ever. But now that I had a job with hours of time on the Internet where I could read and interact with educated people, it was a death sentence for my faith.

I found out very quickly that every Creationist argument I thought I had was easily destroyed by the real facts of science. This did clash with my faith. But I was always as honest with myself as I could be. So I surmised that my understanding of Genesis was seriously flawed. This lead to even more study of ancient Near Eastern mythologies and of the science of biological evolution and the Big Bang. I chose to take a step back from the Bible and read about science from non Creationist, reputable sources like Steven Hawking, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Jerry Coyne, Eugenie Scott and Scientific American.

While other Christians were basically afraid of learning about science, I was boldly eager to learn. They shared an anti-intellectualism. I, however, took certain verses of the Bible to encourage a scientific education. “Perfect love drives out fear... The Spirit will guide you into all truth.” These verses emboldened me to investigated science and even the occult with absolute confidence that there was no such thing as dangerous information and God would guide me through anything at all with no trouble. Unfortunately my wife and church did not share this liberty.

Science did not crush my faith at first. I had faith to believe that somehow God had created and is creating the universe through these natural processes. Why would a supernatural God leave any evidence of His hand in a natural world? That would not make sense to me. There was no need for any “god of the gaps” in my view. What began to truly dissolve my faith were the same issues that troubled Darwin: the horrors and wastefulness of nature. These things did not at all reflect the hand of a loving, wise creator at all. These screamed of mere natural forces blindly at work with no actual purpose or intention of any kind involved. The Creationists were right about pointing out how evolution is filled with extinctions and waste and God was purposeful and good. Soon I could no longer juggle these two opposing realities in my soul.

Around that time I lost my job. I sold our house and moved the family to my wife’s home town. I started working again and the kids were all being home schooled. But I took objection to introducing Ken Ham’s materials to my small children. She firmly objected to this. It was literally Creationism or our marriage.

Also, my wife refused any affection from me on a regular basis. This was contrary to the clear teachings of the New Testament. She also became increasingly disrespectful, loud and aggressive. No matter how clearly I pointed out the Bible’s teachings, she could care less- even though she found her whole identity in being a devout believer. Somehow when it came to marriage, the Bible meant absolutely nothing.

We sought counseling from our church leaders and an independent Christian Counseling Service. One pastor gave us sound counsel but she plainly disregarded it all. The other pastor and the professional Christian counselors each suggested that I may have demons in me or demonic issues due to my desire for sex and my acceptance of the science of evolution. I almost wanted to punch these people. And they gave not a word of critique to my wife.

I begged her to get professional counseling with me from a non Christian Counselor. But she refused this. Soon things came to a head. We had an argument about our lack of sex one night. To make a long story short, she ended up getting steak knives and cutting my left ring finger open. She took our four children and left me. She filed a restraining order against me. She admitted in the paperwork that I did not hit or threaten her or the kids. She admitted that she cut me with a knife and that I did nothing in retaliation. But the state will always err on the side of the woman for the safety of the women and children.

Shortly after this, she nailed me as hard as possible for child and spousal support. When my first check was garnished, I was far in arrears and I am garnished 56% of my income. That first garnishment came out of my first unemployment check because after she left I was laid off. I begged any Christian friends we had to explain to her that I would have to move 780 miles away from her and our kids to my parents’ basement if she didn’t lower my payment to what I could afford. But no one cared to talk to her or me. No one helped. No one in our church even followed what the Bible said about the court of law or about marriages and separation.

Around this time I had a lot to think about and a lot of spare time when I wasn’t at work. So I began reading and reading. Soon I could no longer have any faith. Everywhere I once found God I found nothing but science, psychology and ungrounded faith in stories that didn’t add up at all in light of the facts.

Now I am pursuing an education in nursing. I am plagued with nightmares and tears about my kids. I am only allowed to talk to them on the phone once a week under her supervision. She told me that she will never talk to me again. She told me to get on my knees. She told me that God is much more with her than with me. She laughed at me when I asked her what her and the kids will do when my unemployment stops and she doesn't get $1000 each month from me. She said that God provides everything for her and I am not needed.

If there is a hell I must have died and gone there. I am glad that I no longer believe in heaven or hell. Its a relief. She has no idea I am an atheist because she refuses to talk to me. Breaking the news of my lack of faith to people can be torture.

I have found a deep sense of self through all this. I am unashamed when I look in the mirror- in spite of my failures. I find comfort and reason in Nietzsche, the New Atheists and Darwin. I don't give thought to an afterlife. I feel my conscience liberated. And now I can somehow relate in many ways to Nietzsche when he said “When you stare into the abyss the abyss stares back at you.” Now I very rarely ever have self destructive thoughts like I did when I was a Christian. I simply own my mistakes and failures. I have no sin. I am my own savior and my own redeemer. Its all about me. Now life is for me to make meaning of and to live the best way I can. I am free now. No longer a sheep in a flock am I. Life has gained a new awe.

Sometimes my wife and I watch true crime stories on TV. Justice triumphs in the end . . . usually. At other times, as on the show "Disappeared," the person is not found and the case becomes a "shaggy dog story" (a long story with no end), still unsolved. Doesn't everyone feel cheated, conned into watching, led on when this happens? Why did we waste our time getting involved? One expects our justice system to bring a satisfying end to a case, but even with hundreds of years of practice, this is not always possible.

Lately, the term "closure" has become popular and we encounter it time after time in these crime stories. The kin and friends of the victims must, in their own words, have closure. A tactic of law enforcement officers is to offer a plea bargain, a lesser charge of, say, second degree murder to a criminal, in exchange for the information as to where the murderer buried the victim or victims. One reason for this is closure, meaning that the living can take the body of the victim, bury it, and visit the grave site. (In the ultimate denial of closure, Bin Laden's body was buried at sea.)

Sometimes family members will appear before the TV cameras, while others read their prepared statements in court, expressing their yearning for an explanation from the perpetrator of why their loved one was killed. Many are profoundly disturbed and angry when the jury finds the accused innocent, because a guilty verdict was the only way they thought closure would be satisfied.

Does an absence of closure suggest that there will be no ending to mourning, especially in cases of unexpected sudden deaths from foul play, illness, or accident? Although, it isn't just for such extreme events, but ordinary aggravations, too, that humans seek closure. Humans hate frayed or loose ends. Let a civilization collapse due to war or natural disaster, and at least the war's over, disasters abate, one goes about picking up the pieces. It's a persistent lack of resolution that becomes maddening. More than anything else, an ending needs to come and order re-established. Why do soldiers fight? According to one old saying, it’s "To get it over with.”

Oftentimes, humans go to fantastic ends for the sake of tying up loose ends and gaining closure. They demand resolution, no matter how fantastical or irrational, where all the varieties of grief come together in satisfaction. But life does not always play out like old movie plots, where everything turns out all right in the end. For example, Stalin and Mao really did succeed in getting away with their crimes against humanity. Sometimes kidnappers, con artists, child molesters, rapists, etc., are never caught. Maybe you can see where I'm going with this . . .

In real life, when there aren't any satisfying answers, religion jumps in and fabricates them. Extremes like Heaven, Hell, Nirvana, Paradise, etc., become acceptable ends. These extreme beliefs supply "answers" for grief, frustration, the desire for revenge, and the demand for punishment (which often goes beyond the boundaries of mere justice and fairness). "Any port in a storm" is an old adage for this, to which one sage responded, "ANY port in a storm? What if the port belongs to your enemy?"

Are there any people more vulnerable or gullible than those facing the crises mentioned above? Religions exploit their vulnerability. Because believers demand closure, the theological explanations they are inundated with since youth become their safety nets. Because those extreme explanations bring a kind of closure in times of grief, the exploiters and pushers of those beliefs, even though they themselves may not believe, are caught in the web of expediency, resistant to reality.

Another reward religions offer is a way out for the perpetrators. If they confess, repent, and ask God's forgiveness, they will still go on to eternal bliss. But isn't this "getting away with it?"

In short, religions provide easy answers for closure in an unpredictable and disorderly universe, although their adherents must twist their minds into weird shapes to accommodate them. These easy answers are built on fantasy and survive through group-think and cliché. The believers’ method of picking and choosing what is acceptable as truth often produces the antithesis of truth; but no matter, it's their drug of choice.

Ultimately, religions don’t really explain anything, they just make stuff up, which any witch doctor, psychic, fortune-teller, séance holder, imam, or even you, can do. But, in the real world, sometimes there just isn’t any closure, no ends neatly tied up, because sometimes shit just happens with no rhyme or reason, and no answers or explanations or justice will ever be forthcoming.

I've never given any testimonials before even when I was still a Christian. I did, in fact for many times, visualise my self standing on the stage and give testimonials. Constructing all the points that I wanted to make in my mind. What I've never thought about is, I finally has a chance to give testimony. But sadly (or gladly), it's on an ex-christian site.

I was born in a semi religious family practising what we called Taoism. My parents practice it merely because of the tradition rather than really believing it's true. But my siblings, most of them, are kind of religious. And so did I. But not in Taoism, but in Christianity instead. I was the only Christian in my family, and my family don't like that idea.

Growing up in a Christian School in a country far away from USA, from kindergarten to high school (yes, the same school), I automatically become a believer. Not only a believer, I'm one of the activist in the school church. I very rarely absent from the Sunday School. When I entered high school, I started teaching Sunday School and started serving in the Youth Sunday service. And eventually become the leader of the Youth Committee and the lead musician. Nobody would have imagine what I've become today.

When I entered the 4th year of my high school, I started to get more serious. I started reading bible everyday, I spend most of my time with fellow Christians. I was even offered the opportunity to go to bible school for free (thanks my Mom for rejecting the offer). I understand the bible quite well in term that I can advise people based on the verses on the bible (I still do sometimes). I depends highly on Jesus and think that I'll never live one day without his blessing. I believed in miracles and really encountered them in my life. Jesus was my friend that I can't live one day without talking to him.

Then I went to attend university in another country. I attended different churches in the span of 4 years. But I do settle in one church. I couldn't find a spot where I can fit in anywhere. The churches here are way so different from my old church. My old church is so family based, but the churches here are so well organized that it looks like an business organisation instead. They have big building, epic music performances, rich pastors and really talented people organizing the church. I enjoyed the service very much and really feels the presence of Holy Spirit when we worship him. But somehow, I can't find anywhere that I can serve. I tried to join the music team, but it was put down by the procedure that I have go through. The idea went off. I didn't have much friend in church. I don't feel connected with them at all. Even though we do hang out, they are just too busy to care for my existence and we are like people from different planets. They tried hard to reach me, but I rejected them because it's funny that we are not in the same class, we don't stay in the same neighbourhood, nor we have common interest. I don't find a reason for us to be best friends. So, I became kind of a stranger in the church. You know, the one who everybody know his face but nobody know his name.

I still read my bible. In fact, I read different versions. I still very religious, still believe strongly in miracles. And I keep in touch with my previous church leaders. They are the ones who encouraged me to finish my degree and feed me with those spiritual needs. Without them, I believe that my university life will be so much harder. (I have to thank them for this).

When I started working, my office have some sort of weekly prayer meeting where we study the bible and pray for the company. So, I attended. The prayer meeting leader is one of the worst Christians I've ever met. He drinks, smokes, rude and many others. But, he's kind of know the bible very well (but in a very wrong way I believe). Able to quote the bible verses together with its numbers and exact words from various different versions. But, his interpretation of the bible is totally contradicting my believe. That started my very strong urge to stop attending the meeting. But I keep coming in the believe that he might have some points sometime.

All these things added up started to fade my ignorant. I was from a community where people are so nice to each others. And so, the bible is interpreted as very good moral and I thought everything written there is good. But after experiencing the years with different types of Christians, I started to look at the bible the different way. I started to notice the contradictions in the bible and some of its nonsensicalness. I remember very well the last bible chapters that I read and when I decided to say "fuck this shits". It was the story about Moses telling his people to live the way of God in Leviticus. I questioned, why did God set his law so similar to other religions in the ancient times (like blood offering and the rituals of the worshipping). Is Moses just making these up so his people believe in him?

I started to encounter some of new questions that pissed me off so much. Talk about many people in the bible where God hardened their heart so his ultimate plan can be done. I started to think that maybe I am one of those bible characters that is designed to go to hell. I said "whatever, if it's his will, let it be done" and here I am today, the Exchristian.

Then, I enter the withdrawal period. I can't stop praying or coming to church. I just miss them. So for few months, I keep coming to church as a non-believer. I still believe that there is some sort of scientifically proved benefit that I can get from attending church. Until one day, I realize that this is kind of an addiction for me instead. So I make up my mind and that will be the last time I visited church.

Now, I'm living the bible even though I'm not a Christian. I still believe there is many moral lesson that we can learn from the bible. I also hope that you could please treat our fellow Christian friends with kindness. We want to show that we can be a very nice person as well without the existence of God in our life.

I still have dreams that I thought God will help me realises one day. The different is, I am more realistic now rather than relying heavily on miracles to happen. Life can be tough, but I'm kind of relieved to know that I will not go to hell if I failed. And so I precious every moment of my life, not thinking of killing myself any more (thinking that dead is better though I believed killing my self will bring me to hell). And I can see that I'm a lot happier now than I was (according to my facebook timeline).

I graduated from Bible college this year. Within the next few months I intend to come out to my fundamentalist parents as an agnostic. I am very nervous about it. Has anyone had to go through something similar?

I am especially concerned about my mother's reaction, because she has suffered from anxiety and depression disorders and I have put this off for years for fear of pushing her over the edge. I decided this fall I could not live with my family anymore, in hiding, so I am going to stay with some friends for a few months while I work up the courage to tell my family. My friends know what it is like to hide who you are -- they are a lesbian couple. (How we became best friends is a hilarious and inspiring story . . . my gay-hating parents have no idea that my friends are lesbians.)

Actually, right this very minute, I am about a mile from another Bible college because I am getting my masters degree online and have to take a class on campus. My identity feels stretched to the breaking point. I am excited about this upcoming year, but would like some encouragement. Thank you!

I wasn’t raised in church. My dad, a divorcee on his second wife, had been ostracized from his church at the announcement of the divorce, his status as a deacon was revoked, and those who had called him ‘friend’ turned to enemies. My father had been raised religious, but this trickle-down barely got to me. I heard whispers of Jesus thanks to private Catholic school, but knew little of the bible stories, and thought them to be untrue, until about 16.

I grew up awkward. I was smart, scrawny, and didn’t quite understand social conventions as easily as the rest of my peers. As such, I was picked on, insulted and degraded, and as I didn’t go to church with any of these other ‘good Southern kids’ (south Carolina by the way), I had no outside contact. I had tried a few churches with my mom (who has much of her current happiness thanks to a church) but found everyone to be rude, self-centered, and general stereotypical southern Christians. Then after my freshman year of high school everything changed.

I visited my sister who had just had her first child, and got my first guitar. I loved that guitar. Then I went to school and got my first girlfriend. She went to church; so naturally I followed. I stayed at that church until my junior year of high school. The second church I went to was a good group of kids, that were really freakin nice to me for no reason! Didn’t they know I was weird and bad at jokes and everything? Nope. They didn’t care. They just wanted to be my friend. I dove headfirst into their youth group, into praise and worship leading, and falling all over myself to make up for the years I’d spent without Christ, and got saved the winter of my junior year, baptized in the spring; raised to walk in newness of life. There was also a girl(friend) at that same church but would be extremely lustful after church. Thus the beginning of my hypocrisy and sexual repression… And I went off to college with the assurance that I would be a famous praise and worship leader someday, to study music education and electrical engineering (my two passions) with a new girlfriend that was not promiscuous, but was a pastor’s kid, encouraging (manipulating) me to think that I was destined for god’s work.

I don’t half-ass stuff. I study and work and understand. As an engineering student, I wanted to understand why Christianity worked. I studied the origins of the Bible, using Josh McDowell’s books as a resource. I read about the Council of Nicaea, about the objections, and I had functional answers to everything. I believed that if Jesus could turn water into wine, then he had absolute grasp over time by creating something with the appearance of time (wine). God created dinosaurs and the ideas of evolution to give us something to discover, and to give science a framework, but not because it was just that way. I believed most of Answers in Genesis was incorrect, as it was incompatible with science; the dinosaurs never existed; just their bones. God, after all, could create time, and create an earth with a long date, though it may not be that way. I researched Islam, the Koran, its inception, about the Zaid codecies and the destruction of it, and scoffed at the “stupid Arabics’” holy book, full of errors. I didn’t understand how people were so blind. I studied Mormonism, Scientology, Calvinism, Arminianism, the early church fathers, everything.

I was the president of Fellowship of Christian Athletes. I participated in CRU (formerly Campus Crusade for Christ), Baptist Collegiate Ministries. I worked as a youth intern at a local church, and was a college group bible study leader in another church. I changed churches because I thought one was focused to much on Armenian ideas of salvation by works, and not enough on the glorious grace of Christ. But, I still took every opportunity I could to allow God to make me the praise and worship leader I prayed so diligently to become. This never happened. I was made the president of FCA, when I wanted to be the leader of the band. I led worship for a youth group of about 11 kids. I never led in front of anyone of note. God was blind!

Parallel to all this, my other face was that of struggling with lust and sexual sin. I would keep it at bay for a time, but would always come back to it, pornography, and girls, girls, girls. I was constantly guilty and ashamed. I blamed myself for ruining two girls’ lives, who got pregnant with guys that they dated after me, because I felt like I’d pushed them towards sinfulness instead of holiness. I would date girls, be promiscuous with fondling or lustful thoughts, and flee, as it says to do in the scriptures, leaving tens of girls with emotions and frustrations. This all came to a bit of a head when a girl I kissed on a date contrived a story about assaulting her to her bible study leader at my old college church (the one I’d left). This went around the chain of command and came back to me, removing me from stage. This was one of the biggest steps in my deconversion. Christians were supposed to forgive, not invent stories that consist of defamation and slander. I’m probably going to thank her someday for helping my emancipation. I started doubting. I went to bible study and church, but I no longer cared. I showed up to help out, but nothing more. I started reading evidence to the contrary:

Karen Armstrong's book, "A History of God", as videos from Evid3nc3 and Qualiasoup from YouTube helped me gain perspective on what I believed. God never came through on his promise to make me a praise and worship leader, or to help with sexual sin. The biggest resource game-changer was a book from an atheist friend (that I wish was still nearby so I could thank her for everything) called The Moral Animal: Why We Are, the Way We Are: The New Science of Evolutionary Psychology, and it is an introductory book on evolutionary psychology. The explanations it gave for everything: sex, interpersonal relationships, anger, envy, altruism, group think… everything about my Christian worldview and everything in it… were better. Christianity made less sense than this book. I still believed, but I couldn’t quit thinking about it. Sex and religion were natural consequences of evolution, not of a myth about a creator god that got angry about eating a fruit.

There was no final straw. Over the course of two years, I figured this all out, and finally came out to my bible study. To protect my musical interests and a few paying gigs, I haven’t been public about it, besides silently changing my religious views to Pastafarian and telling a select few group of people about it. I simply tell people I’m ‘evaluating other sources’ when asked about my absence. There is no more guilt, only the freedom of my mind. Where there was unrest, angst, and shame, there is now only sober truth, and that truth has set me free.

This isn't going to be lovely and eloquent like so many of the articles and testimonies on this site, and I apologize in advance if this sounds garbled or angry but this is, truly a rant. A rant from a young woman who is slowly losing her father to religious fervor.

This story begins over twenty years ago, when my parents were young and newly engaged. My mother was (and still is) a truly nondenominational Christian and my father came from a very devout Born Again Christian family. My father brought my mother to meet his parents and my Grandfather locked my mother in a room with him for over 2h and demanded to know who she thought the "head of the household is". When she answered that a marriage was an equal partnership he berated her with Bible verses that said a woman was to obey her husband and that man was the "head of the house and how she was wrong and sinful. Then he asked my father the same question and he answered that marriage was a partnership.

Fast forward to my senior year of high school and my grandparents move from California to North Carolina. My grandfather is "miraculously" diagnosed with multiple myeloma by the first doctor he sees here when "TEN doctors in California couldn't figure out what was wrong with him" (I have a conspiracy theory about this, but that's another post for another day).

Anyway, they move to NC with nothing but their RV and social security and retirement checks. They move in with my family and my Grandfather claims that Jesus came to him in a dream and told him to sell his home in CA and live with us in NC. I was skeptical, but I shrugged it off. Back then I was still identifying as Christian even though I didn't care about Jesus or church.

What needs to be understood, though, is that my father is the only successful son in his family. His other two brothers are... well, they're not nearly as well off as my father is. I mean, we're not in a lot of debt, we have discretionary income, we live in a nice area and they have stable jobs. You'd think my father would be proud--but he puts pressure on himself to impress his parents and be the "good son". It's this strange complex he has where he puts his parents, especially his father, on a pedestal and is blind to their flaws. So when his parents moved in with us, he became rigid and tense and all-consumed by being the "good son" all the time.

It began wearing down my parents' marriage. My mother and I couldn't say a thing about his father unless it was positive. We weren't allowed to complain about their mean old dog who bites and nearly ruined the carpet in the guest room and howled at night. We weren't allowed to ask my Grandfather to cover his mouth when he coughed or point out that it was rude to simply tune us out in the middle of an attempted conversation. We couldn't say that we didn't want his mother to cook because she made the same thing all the time and it tasted terrible.

Then they found their own house and we thought things would get better. They received a huge inheritance from my Great-Grandfather's passing and bought really nice new cars and they had a reverse mortgage and the cancer treatments were covered by insurance and grants. They were much better off than my parents who were still had bills, two teenagers to clothe and feed, four pets and countless other expenses. Yet, yet they acted like they were destitute and my father always paid for their food (and they never once offered to split a check and got expensive entrees) in fact my father got mad when my mother suggested that they pay for their own food once. They lived over an hour away (at first, later they moved closer) and guilted my father into driving over there all the time to do menial chores (like changing a lightbulb or hanging pictures) and kept him away from us.

It got worse when they moved closer. They kept pulling him away from us, and we were called selfish for wanting him to stay home just for one weekend.

Then, my mother's mother was diagnosed with cancer (too late, it had metastasized by the time she sought help) and the family was thrown into turmoil. My mother was destroyed because her mom was literally dying and she lived in California.

My Grandfather, as I'm sure you have determined, thrives on attention. He's always been that way. So he felt jealous that conversation was turned away from him to my Nana and he wanted us to pay attention to him.

So he lied to the entire family. To his church congregation. He said that he had three months to live. Purely for attention. It was my father who caught him in his lie and made him admit to it. His excuse? "I was depressed, I needed your love."

I remember that day so clearly. My grandmother went to the kitchen and cried in my mother's arms. My father looked angry and heartbroken. I left for a few hours. It was then that my father began to see how his father was using his disease as a way to pull sympathy from him, lying about needing money, never considering that he had feelings or wanted to be with us, not caring about us at all really. His idolized view of them began crumbling while his father was in remission.

Then his cancer came back, my Nana died, and he began holding "private Bible studies" with my father and his brother. My father began sounding more and more like him--saying misogynist things about women's places in the house, talking down about science and interfaith cooperation. One day my mother asked him who the head of the house was. His reply?

"The man is the head of the house." He had changed completely. It caused an explosion between him and mom. She finally blew up and he seemed to listen... a little. My mother and I are convinced that he's being brainwashed by his father.

Then, recently, very recently my friend--a Hindu--was called a devil worshipper by some crazy Christian girl and I was entirely appalled by it. I was still struggling with my faithlessness but I knew that was wrong and posted on facebook about religious tolerance and supporting the inclusive "happy holidays". It was an innocent post, despite the ugliness that caused me to post it. My Grandfather proceeded to say that anyone who wasn't Christian should "get over it" and he'd say "merry Christmas" if he damn well pleased and that America is a Christian nation... all sorts of nonsense ultimately ending with saying that nonChristians should get out of America.

I was angry, I admit it. I had always known he was a racist and a misogynist but that he would put something like that out there on my wall. It made me sick, and I basically told him that whether he likes it or not that America is a secular nation, that multiculturalism is not an attack on Christianity and to refrain from posting ignorant and blatantly bigoted statements on my wall ever again. He retorted that I was just a stupid kid who didn't know any better and I told him, basically, that age doesn't trump reason. Two of my friends, who are far more understanding and eloquent than I, tried to explain that times are changing and that our generation needed to be inclusive and understanding of other cultures.

Four days passed and I figured it had blown over and he had realized that what he said was incredibly offensive.

Then I got a call from my mother, in a panic, saying that my Grandfather had called my father and that I would not have a place to come home to if I didn't apologize to him. I was floored, pissed, hurt. Why should I apologize to him when he offended literally everyone who knows me? He put his opinion out there and, as an adult, he should have been prepared for people to disagree with him. My mother said he was embarrassed (rightfully so) and had defriended me.

I asked her why he went to my father instead of coming to me directly. Her answer?

He wanted attention again. He was willing to throw me under the bus under the guise of "defending Christian values" and use my father as an emotional weapon against me. He knows I'm in college under his GI Bill, I can't marry my fiance until I graduate or I lose my funding, I can't move out because I need to remain his dependent to get full benefits. He knows I am financially unable to support myself and that my father would willingly be his white knight against me. Because my father values him over me, over everyone.

So he called me, told me I was stupid, that my friends were stupid, that my opinions were wrong, that I was selfish and mean spirited for telling my Grandfather that he was wrong for being ethnocentric, that I was immature and that unless I "fixed" what was "broken" that I was not welcome back.

I was devestated. I called my Grandfather and apologized--felt lower than low and was told again that I was wrong for having liberal opinions and that he felt that I was purposely baiting him by posting them. I asked why he involved my father, why he waited almost a week to even bring it up and he tried to feed me some BS about how he was "crushed" by my callousness. I honestly stopped listening.

Then after all of that, he said that he forgave me for my rudeness and then my father said he forgave me and that his love was unconditional.

I have since come to terms with my lack of belief in God... but now I have nightmares about being kicked out of my home over my lack of faith. I'm terrified of going home. If a facebook opinion pushed my father to threaten me with being turned out, what would knowing that I'm an atheist do?

I have to bite my tongue when either of them make callous remarks about atheists being evil and about nonChristians burning in hell. I am not allowed to dissent. My father never used to be this way. He was never this much of a tool for his father, he would have never used my dependence on him as a weapon against me... but ever since his father moved here he's become different. Meaner, more judgmental.

I suppose I'm calling for help now. What do I do? I almost don't want to go home because I'm scared. Scared that they might find my copy of The God Delusion, scared of sharing my opinions, of being true to myself. I'm afraid of my father, afraid of the wrath of him and his family for disagreeing with them and their God.

How do I deal with this? I've lost my father to the religious fervor of his own father. He hides behind his disease and his God to justify his actions, his thoughts.

As pathetic as it sounds, I miss my dad. I miss the days when I thought I could go to him for unconditional support. I miss when he would defend what was right and consider my opinions as worth something. I miss my dad who loved me.

Why do people find apocalyptic prophecies so convincing? One of the important reasons why people find prophecies convincing is because prophecies make predictions that have already happened either a while ago or recently. But is that a good reason to be convinced by prophecies? I am going to argue why that particular reasons for the authenticity of prophecy fails because essentially prophecies are using inductive reasoning in order to come to a far-fetched supernatural conclusion. In order to my this argument intelligible and comprehensible, I am going to explain what inductive reasoning in order to show afterwards why prophecies are actually mundane human abilities that disguises itself as supernatural vision. I am also going to show why there is an inherent flaw within prophecies.

Prophecies are actually mundane human ability to predict the future by inferring what will occur from what has consistently and uniformly occurred before. This ability is called inductive reasoning, which is something scientists use (although there are variety kinds of inductive reasoning). The gist of inductive reasoning is this: Suppose that you are in a very large mansion with approximately a hundred rooms with closed doors. To your curiosity you want to explore all these rooms in one week, so you decide to check out these rooms. When you went in front of the first room you opened the door to find a portrait of the owner, you went to the second room to open the door to find a same portrait, and the third room, and so on. Each time you went to the rooms (let’s say forty times already) you find a consistent pattern among these rooms you explored: unlocked doors and the portrait of the owner. With inductive reasoning, you will suppose that the rest of the rooms will probably have unlocked doors with a portrait of the owner. This is a probabilistic kind of reasoning, but it is nonetheless effective in both science and everyday living. It is very natural for us to come to a general conclusion based on multiple similar experiences.

In the similar respect, you would find that past events have consistent uniformed patterns to the point that you took it for granted. You would unsurprisingly, yet perhaps accurately, predict that the next event will probably be like the past events. In this respect, this is what prophecies really are: they predict natural disasters, wars, diseases, rumors of wars, economic collapse (fall of Babylon in Revelation), persecution against religious minorities, etc. Yet the funny thing is that all of these events can already be predicted without prophecies because with inductive reasoning and our basic knowledge of human history, we predict that similar future events will occur similarly. It is simply mundane and unsurprising.

However what makes prophecies more interesting is that it predicts a supernatural event in which God (for Christianity) will suddenly appear to rapture all believers (for evangelicals). Yet this is problematic precisely because of this unusual line of reasoning: consistent and common patterns of events of natural disasters and human atrocities entail an extremely rare and unprecedented future supernatural event? To say that there will probably be natural disasters and human atrocities in the future will be unsurprising and reasonable, due to inductive reasoning, but to suggest that from these common and consistent patterns of natural events entails a supernatural event? How the hell did you get from natural events (disasters in particular) to the supernatural? Or to rephrase it in another similar form of question: How the hell did you get from consistent and common patterns of events to an extremely unprecedented and very rare event? Sure, there have been many unprecedented and rare events, but many of them were natural and human events that are considered rare. There seems to be something very weird in this line of reasoning.

Of course, from an emotional standpoint, if one is in the state of fear, such unusual line of reasoning will not become obvious to them. But from the reasonable and mundane standpoint, a lot of these troubling events that we are facing today are to be reasonably expected given what we know from human and natural history: we had many wars, genocides, exploitation, homicides, earthquakes, hurricanes, floods, and diseases. But what about Global Warming? It probably has already happened millions of years ago when huge volcanic eruptions happened in Serbia. What about the economic crisis today? Although its magnitude is unprecedented, economic crisis has happened before such as the Great Depression. What about 9/11? Terrorist already tried to blow up one of the towers before 9/11. The reason why these kinds of events may seem unprecedented for many people is because we tend to forget that similar events (though different in certain respects) have happened before.

Perhaps this is where History and Science becomes useful to humanity: it can remind us that what we are experiencing now is possibly not very new in the large scheme of things. Many of the things that we experience to be new are not actually all that new in the natural and historical standpoint. We shouldn’t find them all that surprising or unexplained, but then again our own personal lives still have special moments that we can cherish.

So what are wrong with prophecies? Prophecies seem surprising to many believers (and sometimes doubters) because of our ignorance of the historical and natural pasts as well as the abuse of our inductive reasoning. Also when we can easily predict these natural disasters and human atrocities with inductive reasoning independently of prophecies, it seems superfluous to explain the apparently unexpected events with prophecies than with inductive reasoning. It is also precisely because prophecies used inductive reasoning and then abused it in the end that makes prophecies less appealing. What makes prophecies an abuse of inductive reasoning is when it concludes a rare and unprecedented supernatural event from very common and consistent pattern of natural events (including human events), which certainly seems like a very large leap.

One of the strangest foundational beliefs of Christianity is that belief in Jesus is a moral issue. In the Bible, Jesus is crystal clear that the worst sin of all is to not believe in him. In fact, Christianity plainly decrees that belief in the divinity of Jesus Christ is more important to one’s salvation than living a moral life. All one may accomplish in the way of living a moral life can be erased completely by the simple act of not believing in Jesus. That’s the biggest sin (with the possible exception of blaspheming the Holy Spirit), and one that assures you of a one-way ticket to hell.

This is made perfectly clear in John 8:24, where Jesus says: “I said therefore unto you, that ye shall die in your sins: for if ye believe not that I am he, ye shall die in your sins.” And, as we know, to die in sin means hell is your destination.

Further evidence is provided in a parable where Jesus is clearly referring to himself: “If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.”

Here is how one Christian apologetics site puts it. (http://www.jesus-is-lord.com/hellreal.htm): “In order to be saved, you have to repent of your sins and believe that Jesus died for you, was buried, and rose again the third day. . . The Lord Jesus Christ came to rescue us from sin and from the wages of sin which is death (physical death and everlasting torment in hell and the lake of fire).”

In Christian dogma, it is so important that one believes in the divinity of Jesus Christ that the New Testament is crammed full of warnings and outright threats on this issue. However, one passage in Matthew pretty well sums it up (Matthew 10:28): “And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.” In short, do as I say, and believe as I say, or suffer everlasting pain in hell.

My point here is that it is illogical to believe that a real god has actually threatened that you must believe or you will end up in hell. Surely a real god would realize that we have limited control over what we believe. Can we, as adults, believe in Santa Claus, no matter how hard we try? And how does obedience under threat from a more-powerful being become a moral matter? No SENSIBLE god would come up with such a scheme. Obviously, this is an idea that was created and propagated by primitive men.

How can anyone think it reasonable to make a moral issue of belief, something we have so little control over? In our legal systems, we are judged by what we do, and never on what we think or believe. We would not find a man guilty of anything in our courts if his only “crime” was thinking all Catholics, communists, or tuba players should be neutered. Until he acts on this belief, and harms someone, he is free to think as he pleases. Does it make sense to believe that a god would hold us blameworthy for our beliefs, if we harm no one because of them? Again, doesn’t this sound rather like something primitive men might come up with in order to scare us into believing what they want us to believe?

Does belief in the divinity of Jesus Christ actually define a person as moral? Shouldn’t it take a lot more than this for one to be considered moral? Should we consider as moral that priest who raped little boys over and over, yet believed in the divinity of Jesus Christ? Should his belief really be enough? Conversely, shouldn’t it take a lot more than disbelief to make one immoral, and deserving of punishment?

Islam claims that Mohammed was taken bodily up into heaven on his white horse. Now what would the Christian think if told that he must believe this or he deserves to suffer in hell? Wouldn’t he object that he can’t just will himself to believe something that makes no sense to him? Wouldn’t the Christian think this is terribly unfair and that no compassionate god would ever come up with such an unfair scheme? Well this is what atheists and agnostics believe; that a demand to believe in Jesus or suffer in hell is clearly unreasonable, unfair and un-godlike.

There is a very serious fairness issue here. We naturally assume that only bad people deserve to be punished. But how does not believing in Jesus make me a bad person? I mean no harm to anyone. And I don’t disbelieve out of some childish petulance or rebellion. I simply find it impossible to believe that a man was dead and then came back to life, without a whole lot more evidence. Is this so terribly unreasonable?

What, after all, is the evidence for the divinity of Jesus Christ? All we have are the words of the New Testament, written in ancient times, twenty centuries ago. A number of Biblical scholars question whether this man Jesus even existed, suggesting (among several theories) that perhaps he was a run-of-the-mill, soapbox preacher around whom a legend of miracles grew up over several decades. Whether one accepts or rejects such a theory, it should be acknowledged that it cannot be disproven with certainty, since there is no hard physical evidence of photos, film, fingerprints, DNA, or anything else.

Here is the essential claim of Jesus (Matt. 11:4-6): "Go back to John and tell him about the things that you hear and see: Blind people are able to see again; crippled people are able to walk again; people that have leprosy are healed; deaf people can hear again; dead people are raised from death; and the Good News is told to the poor people. The person that can accept me is blessed."

He says, then, that anyone who can believe that this list of miracles actually happened, can simply take his word for it - for he offers no evidence beyond his words - is blessed. And, it is implied, those who cannot are consigned to hell.

Now, since I have, at best, only limited control over what I can believe, how could a just and compassionate god forsake me for not being able to believe this list of miracles? Note that I said, “. . . not being ABLE to believe.” I did not say CHOOSING not to believe. I am not making a choice here; I don’t have a choice. I have never seen a miracle, nor have I ever heard a believable account of a miracle. I have been studying science for six decades or so and everything I have learned about it tells me that the laws of nature cannot be violated, ever. I think I am justified in believing this because there is not a single case on record, not one, verified by experiment and peer review, of any of those laws ever being violated.

As far as I can see, I am left with the choice of believing a statement in an ancient book, by an unknown author from a primitive, superstitious age, or believing in the accumulated record of modern science. I contend that the only people who believe in those miracles, and the divinity of Jesus Christ, are those who have taken a leap of faith. They have decided to assume as true what cannot be proven.

To suggest that an intelligent god would punish me with everlasting pain because I could not make that leap, that assumption really - and think it made any sense - is absurd. To think belief could ever be properly considered a moral issue, especially by a god, is equally absurd.

First off let me say that I have been reading the testimonials here on Ex-Christian for some time now and it always invokes a range of emotions within me. So I have finally worked up the nerve to share my story in the hopes that someone out there who is struggling with their own faith can find a little comfort and know that they aren't alone. De-converting, for me, was an extremely painful process. Combined with absolutely no support and a sense of disgust from my family, it almost took my life.

So... here we go.

I was raised in a fairly strict Southern Baptist family smack in the middle of Oklahoma. Religion was a VERY big part of my life starting at the earliest that I can remember. Hell, my parents even had me in a small private christian school which oddly enough was Assembly of God in denomination. As you can imagine this confused me quite a bit. Here we have two different sides of the same religion each pushing their own special set of beliefs upon me from about the age of 5 until I was 12. My church taught me that once I was "saved" I was always "saved" and could never be "unsaved" and if anyone claimed to be "unsaved" then they were just never really "saved" to begin with. On the other hand there was my school that taught me that I could, in fact, be "unsaved" and that if I messed up I'd be on a path directly to hell. I had better get "re-saved" lest I face eternal damnation in hell... this scared the shit out of me. One of my teachers even told me in the third grade that if I even break one of the 10 commandments I'd be back on the path of fire and brimstone. Coming to my parents with these concerns, they of course told me that this other brand of christianity was incorrect and that the Southern Baptist point of view was the correct one, why they didn't take me out of such a confusing situation I shall never know. None the less I listened to them and was a good little Christian boy up through the rest of grade school.

The summer after 6th grade my family moved to a different part of town. I was plucked from my comfortable little christian class of about 20 students and placed deep into the dark bowls of the secular public school system with hundreds and hundreds of other 7th graders. This was a huge culture shock for me. I didn't know but maybe two or three other friends that came from the same old private school as me. I felt like an outcast and my parents certainly didn't help the situation. Because of their convictions, I wasn't allowed to have any friends outside of the youth group at church, watch any movies above a PG rating, listen to any music other than what was on the christian radio station. Basically I was considered to be a good-goody, I was picked on and bullied heavily because of it. At church I was told that this was because I was a Christian and that the secular world hates the righteous, and as christians we are to be persecuted for christ by the world, that somehow it made me a better christian and I ate it up. I stayed strong in the faith and continued to let them spoon feed me their apologetics and circular logic.

The next few years weighed heavy on me, and then what (at the time) I thought was the worst thing to ever happen to me happened... I began to notice other boys. I thought it was a phase at first, a test from god, temptations from the devil. I blamed whatever I could to take the focus off of myself. There was absolutely no way I was going to let myself be one of those dirty homosexuals. Those feelings never did go away though, they only got stronger and stronger. Growing up I was taught that gay people are filthy and disgusting, and thats exactly how I felt. No one knew I was gay, I managed to keep it hidden for years and years. I lived my life in constant fear that someone at church would find out, that my friends would quit talking to me, that I would be shunned, that my family wouldn't love me. I heard the horrible way my friends and family would talk about gay people at church, and school and home. These supposed christians, the same ones that preach love and compassion and forgiveness also preaching hate and condemnation. To the young developing teenage mind it's an enormous cluster-fuck.

I prayed and prayed for god to take this away from me and he never did. I felt like he had abandoned me, and so I became deeply depressed. This deep depression led to me doing bad in school. Doing bad in school led to me being in trouble at home. I was grounded constantly and never allowed to see my friends. I was so depressed it made me sick, literally. I began getting these terrible stomach aches. I told my parents about it but they didn't seem to think anything of it and told me that depression is a normal part of being a teenager, it was just a phase and I'd get over it. Well I didn't, I got so sick and so bad I couldn't even keep food down. By the time I was in the 10th grade I weighed about 84 pounds. I missed so much school I wouldn't have passed the grade without a doctors note. That summer I was hospitalized for about the entire summer. Once my parents finally figured out that just praying about it wasn't going to work. I was finally diagnosed with Crohn's disease and guess what it can be caused by? Depression! DING DING DING! that's right folks! any way to cut a long story short I ended up having surgery to take some of my intestines and my appendix out. They were swollen so large that the passage through was about the size of a .5 pencil led.

Now you may be asking what does this have to do with god Jason? Why lead into this long story about health and whatnot? The answer my friend, is that it played a huge role in me beginning to question my faith. Why did I have to suffer like that? The people in my church and my pastor told me it was all a part of god's will. Part of the master plan and all that shit. I was suffering for god so that I could be a living witness, so people could see that he blessed me with the miracle of life. And you know what? For the first time I didn't buy into it. Why on earth would god let all this suffering happen? Now I don't mean just my suffering, I mean all the suffering in the world. He would certainly have allot more followers if he weren't such a stingy prick about it and all now wouldn't he? Why are there starving children in the world, why is there homelessness, war, famine, disease. Why does a loving god allow this to happen to his children and if it's all because it's in his will, his grand master plan, I have to wonder just what kind of fucked up plan is this? The only good that came from it was I got to get shot up with Demerol every two hours on the hour!

Yes... the wheels in my head were beginning to turn (of course I never let my family on to this)

Still being a believer at the time I felt bitter and angry with god. I held onto these questions all through my high school years and eventually the depression began to kick back in... and then I wen't to college.

My first year of college was quite the experience. I began to see the world for the first time, the real world, the logic, the lies I had been told my entire life were for the first time in my life plain as day. I began to see inconsistencies and contradictions within the bible. My mind was full of questions and when I went to my family and church with these questions I could never get a straightforward answer.
Why is there a hell? Why would an all loving god send his wonderful, beautiful creations to hell? Why would he send someone there simply for having never had the chance to hear the gospel and love of Jesus?
"Well you see son, everyone can see the glory of God in everything around them if they just open their eyes and look, it would be stupid to assume that this world wasn't intelligently designed, thus everyone is held accountable and actively choosing not to believe in him because they don't want to quit sinning! God can't let that go unpunished"
You know... stuff like that.

I could go on and on with examples but for the sake of time I wont.

So about this time in my life I started coming out to my friends, it was a loooong and drawn out process. Eventually due to certain circumstances, I was outed to my parents. They just sat there and stared at me for what felt like hours, while this was happening I decided to just go all in and tell them I didn't believe in god anymore. In retrospect, it probably wasn't the best idea at the time but I'm glad I got it all out in the open.
My parents and I argued over these things furiously for the next few years. Eventually I became suicidal so they sent me to a "christians counselor" (FYI: a fake psychologist) who tried to exorcize the gayness out of me...yea well that didn't fly to well with me so eventually they sent me to a real psychologist who helped me work through my problems. He didn't judge me, he listened to me, which was something I had never experienced outside of my friends. He helped me get off of drugs and helped me get back on the right track in school.

You know what my parents did when they found out he wasn't trying to de-gay me though? They told me they weren't going to pay for sessions any more. In my time with him though he recommended several books on faith and doubting your faith, it was something I struggled deeply with. When I realized that God wasn't there, that what I had been taught basically my entire life was a giant lie my heart was broken. All of a sudden I felt alone, a small speck in the universe. It was painful and I ended up turning to drugs and alcohol for quite some time before getting my life back on track. About a year ago I finally ended up becoming comfortable with my loss of faith. My family still stands by that old idea that I was never a Christian to begin with and it was painful for a while.

I moved out of state for a while to experience the real world on my own without the blinders on and I couldn't be happier. I've grown as a person in ways I never could have with the shackles of religion. I've learned that I'm ok with who I am and that I don't have to hate myself for being who I am. I'm living for me in my life now and not for a tyrant in the afterlife who wants to damn me FOREVER for something temporary.

The best advice I can give is to talk to people and do what you have to do to make yourself happy. It won't always be easy but it will be worth it and you will be SO much happier in the end of it all. Find a friend, get support. You DON'T have to suffer alone.

I can only hope that my extemporaneous writings this a.m. are as eloquent as those of others visiting this site, as soon as I complete this draft, I'm sending in some moola. And I'm unemployed.

To some, my story may seem trivial, to me, it is not. I guess we could all write the same. So where to begin . . . how about the cliff notes version

#1: Thank God for this site ;-).
#2: A natural desire to follow our programming
#3: The problem of 'bad code'
#4: A new awareness

#1: What a breath of fresh-air this site has been for me this morning. When you suffer from erroneous programming its hard to see reality. When you're disappointed with the lemon peels of life there is a natural desire to internalize and self blame for one's circumstances. And unfortunately, when one is raised on 'christian ideals' there is a tendency to 'blame ourselves for the circumstances that GOD has delivered upon us'. The right question is 'why is this happening and what can I do about it' the wrong question is 'why is GOD allowing this to happen to me, I've been a good person. The Christian mantra would have us answer, you have not been obedient enough, worshiped enough, studied your bible enough. God is teaching you a lesson, you need to draw closer to him. The lunacy is perpetuated. Because life involves suffering and God is perfect, then we must be responsible in our deficient attempts at faith, the cure closer allegiance to the cult.

#2: We are not so different from the animals seen in nature films; we are imprinted. Depending upon the christian culture within ones home, this degree of imprinting can vary, be it, as in my case, episcopalian to some more extreme fundamentalist orientation. But we are imprinted and we tend to return to these roots when times get bad. We try to resolve 'the cause' for our misfortune, where we went astray and as Christians (former) we look to our faith for answers. For me, I have been revisiting my programming. Earlier this year I did a sort of life tally (I'm 50 and its been work, some good, mostly difficult, lots of disappointments). I recently expressed to my fundamentalist brothers' family the question, "Why would I want to spend eternity with the guy who sent me here?" and more generally, "[if god exists] why is there so much suffering in the world?" This site really opened my eye's to the lunacy of it all. Specifically the thread on "The Christian Cult: Brainwash and Mind Control in the Name of the Lord?". For years I believed in this God-centered programming, I now reject all of it. Well not all, I still want to be a good, kind, thoughtful person, that programming will remain; but I no longer subscribe to some 'rewards based' life philosophy.

#3: We as a society need to start recognizing that the fruits of our efforts lie in the education and establishment of the beliefs of the youth and the masses. We must recognize that a philosophy based exclusively on competition or cooperation is flawed. Both are required. I had sociology this summer and it too opened my eyes to the reality of economic stratification both domestically and internationally. How easy it is for the wealthy Christians of the world to believe God has 'blessed' them for they are good. There a numerous cases of the blessed being evil and the disadvantaged being good. Education is the source of enlightenment, not some divine power cell in the sky.

#4: A favorite argument of these Christians is the question, Jesus was either a lunatic, a liar, or a God. I won't write of this a eloquently as some, but to me, there is a simple answer. Jesus was a brilliant liar, a man who was raised Jewish and experienced a divided world (Jews and Non-Jews) where salvation was bought. He was a great teacher who redefined (at his own choosing and not Gods) the definition of salvation. Placing the responsibility for 'salvation'; which I'll define as life without guilt, on the individual and demanding that individuals love one another and of course, because his audience was generally pagan, they must love GOD too. I'm not so keen on this second part.

We now have the knowledge to see this basic fact. Just as Divinci was a genius and hundreds of years ahead of his time, so was Jesus. Our responsibility is to recognize the appropriateness of (at least some) of his teachings without falling victimized to the crazy cult tendencies of the fundamentalists. We do have a responsibility to ourselves and one another, but we cannot afford the luxury of relying on some mystic power cell in the sky who by all counts if he exists (which I doubt) is either an asshole, absent, asleep, or none caring.

We are responsible to ourselves and one another; we should learn to live with tolerance in a spirit that supports mutual fulfillment for ourselves and one another.

I am at a hiatus in my longstanding altitude of skepticism concerning almost everything. It just doesn't work for me anymore now that I have to come to a complete and unequivocal disbelief in all things religious.

Offered as explanation~

The evidence for the Christian religion and the Bible as being just a plagiarized collection of parts and pieces of other religions all cobbled together with a large amount of Jewish history and belief that had been passed down for many generations and codified into a cannon, for the purpose of unifying and strengthening emperor Constantine's control over the Roman empire, is all too obvious. So obvious that I have become bored with it.

I used to love it when a Jesus freak, christobot would come to this site (Ex-Christian), spouting all of his/her hackneyed phrases, full of circular reasoning, and ridiculous biblical jargon, about how Jesus died for me and by doing this, all of my sins are forgiven.

I knew from reading on Ex-Christian for several years that we have people here who are so knowledgeable of the bible and so adept at shredding each Illogical irrational statement by the Christian cult robots that I was going to see anther true,(usually displaying borderline illiteracy), Christian, who probably hadn't read anything here, get his clock cleaned.

First of all the whole son of god shtick didn't and doesn't make any sense to me, and add to that it was so obviously copied from earlier religions in which god mated with a human to have a son who was sacrificed in order to save the rest of us.

After hours, and days, and weeks, and years, of reading, what many brilliant and learned people had to say, people on this web site, and in books written by Harris, Dawkins, Tarico, Hitchens, Dennett, Loftus, et cetera, I have become so convinced of the wrongness of having faith in imaginary gods, saviors, angels, devils, heavens and hells and the like, that to see someone trying to apologize and explain this kind of nonsense, just does not compute anymore. I keep saying to myself, "cant these people read?" "Why would they want to be told what to think by a cult?" And the Christian Religion fits and has every aspect of a cult. (see>)

I do believe however that some people are not capable of giving up their belief in magical, mystical things that give them a feeling of confidence that they are being watched over and cared for by a supreme being. I's all emotion and completely impervious to reason.

Those of us who do escape to reality and learn to live in the real world can just count ourselves lucky. I think the mystery of life,is,the beauty of life. None of us know what wondrous things we may experience before we sleep.

We Homo Sapiens are all in this life together, none of us were born into sin. there ain't no heaven or hell, the god of the bible is a ridiculous construct by ancient men and if mankind doesn't make itself extinct, maybe some day we will evolve into a species that can leave the slavery of faith behind in favor of the freedom of reality.

I reiterate that people who stumble upon this web site and proceed to try to set us all straight as to where we went wrong with being true Christians. Most of whom display a profound ignorance of the fact that science has virtually made faith in religions stupid and archaic, are, to use an old expression, BORING!

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